In a move that might seem sudden to some, Daniel Ghita will be moving his base of operations to the United States in the near future. The move comes at the behest of Alistair Overeem, who recently inked an agreement with the "Blackzilian" camp in Florida that is run by Authentic Sports Management, led by Glenn Robinson. Now, if your question is why would Daniel Ghita move to the United States because of Alistair Overeem moving there, the answer is simple; Daniel Ghita has been a vital part of Alistair Overeem's recent training and has become such an asset that Overeem wanted to lock him up.

This comes after there were rumors that Junior Dos Santos was trying to bring Daniel Ghita into his camp to help prepare for Alistair Overeem, knowing that Ghita had worked with Overeem on his last fight and would be a good sparring partner as well. We confirmed this with Anil Dubar earlier in the week, but at that point there had been no decision yet. There is a good chance that when Overeem and his people found out about JDS trying to lure Ghita to Brazil there became an immediate need to lock down Daniel Ghita to ensure he wasn't snatched up.

Ghita's home base will be in Florida now, but he has spoken to Sport.ro and said that his focus is still on competing in Kickboxing (noted: K-1), but he will also be training with UFC fighters as well. This will probably bring about rumors of Ghita making a switch to MMA, but as we saw from Tyrone Spong, training in a camp with MMA fighters will not exactly negate your skills as a Kickboxer and Ghita should be fine training for future bouts there.

Update: Anil Dubar confirmed to us that Ghita will only be staying there for two months.

It's Showtime 55 was an explosive show, and in the realm of the Heavyweight division helped to organize it and make some sense of what was a rather confusing division. The retirement of Badr Hari was the big story for this show, and quite honestly, Badr Hari looked better than he has looked in a long, long time in the ring. He was focused, in control and defending just about everything that Saki had to offer. It is a shame that we will not get to watch him fight again for an undisclosed amount of time, but he is off to try his hand at Boxing where he will try to become a star in America.

What is clear is that Daniel Ghita's win over Hesdy Gerges has proven that Ghita is finally making good on his potential. Ghita burst onto the international scene in 2009 when he first appeared in the It's Showtime ring, stopping Tomas Hron with deadly low kicks. He then went on to win the K-1 WGP Final Qualifying Tournament in Japan three months later, which gave him the unenviable task of making his K-1 World Grand Prix Final 16 debut against Semmy Schilt. Ghita was yet to become a complete fighter and Semmy was able to pick him apart in typical Schilt fashion. The years that have followed have been important learning years for Ghita, with the last two years in particular with him realizing that he needed to improve his hands to hang with the elite Heavyweights.

The big fights are what attract fans to kickboxing, and while there are rumblings of K-1 returning at some point this year and putting on shows featuring Heavyweights and Super Heavyweights, but no one is quite certain if the same line up of elite fighters will be willing to do business with K-1 due to outstanding debts and fears of not being paid promptly. Where K-1 lacks, other promoters will always step forward and pick up the slack, which is what is happening now. According to Romanian site GSP.ro (I know, I know), Daniel Ghita is set to do battle with Badr Hari not once but twice.

"It's an honor for me to fight the best K-1 fighter," Ghita told the press.

The first fight is apparently set to happen on September 11th of this year in Amsterdam promoted by none other than It's Showtime. This is a fight that has been a long time in the making, with rumors of the fight being in negotiations before the May 14th Lyon It's Showtime show. What's interesting is that it appears that It's Showtime will continue with their pattern of putting on two big shows back-to-back, with the Fast and Furious tournament happening on September 24th in Brussels, Belgium featuring a 70kg MAX tournament between the best in the world. If the September 11th fight is indeed to take place in Amsterdam, the question to ask is where the fight will take place. There have been rumors that It's Showtime was still looking to run the Amsterdam ArenA in the fall, but with no concrete date or headlining fight yet.

A fight between Daniel Ghita and Badr Hari would seem to be that big fight that could help spur a huge event, but there are a lot of venues for them to promote, so we'll have to wait and see.

Eduard Irimia, the promoter of the Local Kombat series in Romania is also quoted saying that Badr Hari will once again face off with the Romanian Ghita for Local Kombat in early 2012, which coincides with his statements a few weeks ago that he was putting together a Ghita and Hari showdown in Romania "soon."

It is a fantastic matchup and I'm sure no one will complain about coming back for seconds. [source]

Without a doubt, the man of the hour right now in the world of Heavyweight Kickboxing is Daniel Ghita. There are other big names in the sport, like Semmy Schilt, Badr Hari, Gokhan Saki and Errol Zimmerman, but Daniel Ghita is making short work of everyone put in his path, and if the amount of opponents that pulled out of the fight with him from this past weekend's K-1 event is any indication, he's pretty well-feared. In a recent interview with a Romanian website, he discussed his recent fights, his future and talked about an interesting twist for his fight on June 30th, as Gokhan Saki was offered the fight with him, but demanded too much money. (Thanks to effin for the translation).

Until Roche, your adversaries had to be Paul Slowinski or Damian Garcia. Do you think they feared you?Surely. Slowinski accepted the fight initially, but later he stopped answering his phone. The same happened with Garcia. Anyway, it wasn't beneficially for me to change 3 adversaries in a few days. You prepare a tactic before the fight, for a specific adversary.

You fight on 30th of june with Frederic Sinistra, in his home country, Belgium. How do you see the fight?Sinistra is a star in Belgium, he even fought with Badr Hari. I hope to not have any problems and finish the fight by KO.

Have you set a personal target, to KO all of your adversaries?Yes, because i know i can do it currently. I want to KO every single one of my adversaries this year.

We know you offered Gokhan Saki for a 30th of june fight, but he did not accepted.And so it is. But Saki asked 3 times more money to fight me and the match failed to go through. If you have the heart of a lion, you fight with the best. He feared me, surely.

Because we've wanted to get to the bottom of this whole Gerges mess, we've reached out to a lot of really strong sources on the matter, you know, the reliable type that is always happy to talk about stuff. Well, no one is saying a word about the Hesdy Gerges situation right now, which to me is not exactly the greatest sign, but could also be good for Hesdy Gerges as I simply think that a lot of people aren't sure what is going on.

There is one man that is talking, and he is talking about the other thing we care about; FIGHTS. Daniel Ghita has sparked a new rumor by appearing on Romanian television to talk about his upcoming fight, which he has no opponent. Apparently there are two men in contention right now to fight Ghita and both of them are very worthy replacements. The first is Tyrone Spong. Spong is the muay thai standout that within the under 95kgs division was seen as the best fighter, bar none. Well, he wanted to compete on the K-1 level, so he bulked up, and the results were mixed at first, but there has definitely been a positive change.

A fight with Ghita could be great for his career and a giant win that he has been looking for. The other opponent? None other than the Bad Boy himself, Badr Hari. Badr Hari is ready to fight, as he has been training since his release from prison and has recently been preparing to fight in May. We might not have to wait that long, though, as with Gerges on the shelf, Badr Hari could very well be his replacement and kick off 2011 with style, clashing with Daniel Ghita.

So, who would you like to see Ghita fight in the main event of It's Showtime's event on March 6?

The news about Badr Hari, Gokhan Saki and Tyrone Spong’s imminent departures from the sport of Kickboxing behind to pursue other interests in the combat sports world has had the world talking about Heavyweight Kickboxing, but most of the discussion has not been complimentary, instead it has been gloom and doom. It is understandable to be upset over three big stars departing the world of Kickboxing; Saki and Hari for Boxing and Spong for MMA, because over the past few years they have been the golden standard of “young fighters” and shown a strong future for the sport. Yet the talk is that the well has gone dry, that there is no money in Kickboxing because of K-1’s financial distress and that elite talent will no longer look to Kickboxing as a viable career.

This is incredibly inaccurate and echoes a lot of the same sentiments that were heard about Boxing when MMA began to rise into prominence. Many were quick to declare Boxing as a dead sport or at least on a steady enough decline to where within a matter of years Mixed Martial Arts would completely over take it and no more young talent would turn to Boxing. Instead we’ve seen Boxing continue to march forward, new stars being developed and dominant fighters like Manny Pacquiao, Floyd Mayweather, the Klitschko brothers and more steal headlines and attract more and more fans. MMA enthusiasts will argue that there are so few big Boxing PPVs that of course the big fights drawing in the million buys or more range makes sense, that UFC’s business model is to get consistent buys for lesser fights. Boxing fans would note that no UFC fighter outside of Brock Lesnar has the ability to draw mainstream interest or PPV buys like a Floyd Mayweather or a Manny Pacquiao can.

The truth is somewhere in the middle, where both sports are entirely different sports and can easily co-exist with there still being a wealth of talent in each sport. For Kickboxing the same is true. There is no doubt that as MMA grows it will attract some talented fighters who could have otherwise made a successful career in Kickboxing, Boxing or Muay Thai, but that does not mean that any sport will be run out of business or talent because of it. Each sport is distinctly different and some fighters find their calling and stick with it. Not every fighter has a passion for grappling like they do for stand up fighting, why would they jump to a sport like MMA where in the United States traditional wrestling dominates a lot of where the fights take place and how they are paced?

In Europe and Asia there is still strong support for Kickboxing and Muay Thai, with it built into the culture much like in the Midwestern United States strong wrestling programs are built into the culture and in urban areas of the United States youth Boxing programs are there. Children grow up learning how to Kickbox in the Netherlands, UK, Australia and many other countries, it is hard to imagine a sport like Kickboxing simply dying off because of a predominantly American sport like MMA is finally starting to create “millionaires” as Dana White has gone on record stating.

It is safe to say that Daniel Ghita made an impression on fans across the world on January 28th, so much so that his status within the Heavyweight division has shot up and many are considering him to be one of the best, if not the best Heavyweight in the world. It was immediately clear to us that we had to pick Daniel Ghita’s mind and find out what the future holds for him. The only problem is, as is in most cases, Ghita’s english is not as great as it could be, so we reached out instead to his trainer Anil Dunbar to have him translate the questions for us and then translate his answers into English. A special thanks goes to Anil Dubar for making the interview happen as well as Karel ten Haaf for getting us into contact with Mr. Dubar.

First of all, congratulations on the win over Hesdy Gerges. Huge win and incredibly impressive.

Thank you very much, it was a good strategy that my trainer, Anil Dubar choose for me and it worked perfectly.

I think it is fair to say that everyone is thoroughly impressed with Ghita's knockout of Hesdy Gerges and his performance in general. Gerges is an incredibly tough fighter whose defenses are usually air tight. If you need an example of that, go no further than watching the controversial bout between Gerges and Badr Hari in 2010 where Badr Hari was throwing everything that he had at Gerges but Gerges would not go down. It led to one of the "Badr Moments" that we will all miss so much where Badr Hari pushed Gerges down and punted him in the face. After the beating that Badr put on Gokhan Saki, you should be able to appreciate just how good Gerges's defenses are against powerful hands.

So the marvel is that Daniel Ghita, the man who we have all labeled as the guy with no hands went ahead and took Gerges out of the game with a marvelous three-punch combination. Watch the fight again. The game plan for Gerges early on was to not allow Ghita to get into a rhythm with his kicks. Ghita quickly walked Gerges down into the corner and began his barrage of kicks, which Gerges was able to check or defend while keeping his hands up near his head to defend against possible punches. Ghita then began throwing combinations while in the corner, mixing it up just enough to begin cutting away at Gerges's defenses. Ghita's jab became incredibly important all of a sudden, as he was using it to set up the low kick, and then other times he was not. So now every time Ghita was throwing the jab, Gerges had to wonder if the low kick was going to follow, or if Ghita was just going to jab.

When fight fans think about a fighter, especially a rising star, I’m surprised how few think about the term narrative. To me, the narrative of a fighter’s career and of each fight is one of the most alluring parts of the fight game, and partially why Kickboxing has always aced Mixed Martial Arts for me. Sure, the kicks, the clinch game and the constant action helps, but K-1 especially did a great job in the 90’s and early 00’s of building up new stars and telling a story to the world, as opposed to simply pushing out fighters and booking them in competitive fights.

I’m not trashing competitive fights, just saying that simply booking them alone is not always enough in building a star. This line of thought crossed my mind when it became clear this week that K-1 had Daniel Ghita on the hook for the K-1 World Grand Prix, and instead of reeling him in and claiming the biggest star and most talented Heavyweight in Kickboxing today, they opted to let him go due to fears of him jumping to the competition after fighting for them and winning their tournament. I understand that line of reasoning, but the truth is, there is a good chance of Daniel Ghita, potentially the best Heavyweight alive in the world right now, might have to sit out the 2012 tournament season due to politics. This is all happening right when his star has been cemented and the narrative has been in place that Daniel Ghita is the best in the world, just ready to claim his throne.